Welcome back to John and hello to everyone: Just a few words in
reponse...
> -----Original Message-----
> From: John Beasley [SMTP:beasley@qld.cc]
> Sent: Friday, September 17, 1999 1:54 PM
> To: moq_discuss@moq.org
> Subject: MD Mystic MOQ
>
> David B and David L,
>
> I wonder how you explain that most people seem not to experience the
> mystic
> 'reality', and from my reading of books on Zen, for example, it seems
> many people spend
> many years in meditation and yet seem not to reach 'enlightenment'.
>
[David Buchanan] Even though I make certain claims about having
mystical experiences, I woundn't even think of claiming to be
enlightened. But it hasn't hurt any, and those experiences have led my
intellectual curiosities in a certain direction. Even "awakened" seems
to strong a word, but I do feel the experiences have activated natural
latent forces in my mind.
>
> Indeed, I have a couple of friends in this category, true believers in
> mysticism, but still seeking.
> For them mysticism islike a comforting religion or philosophy, but
> hardly an experienced reality.
> It is this version of mystic 'belief' that I criticize.
>
[David Buchanan] True believers always scare me a little. The
phrase "true believers in mysticism" strikes me as oxymoronic, but I
suppose nothing in the world is immune to that kind of corruption.
Still, "true believer" and "mystic" have nearly opposite meanings in our
language and there's not SUPPOSED to be such a thing. But you gotta give
your friends some credit for trying to have a noble goal. Behind door
number one is peace of mind. (silence) Behind door number two is total
enlightenment. (Murmurs and whispers) And behind door number three is...
A NEW CAR !! ( The crowd explodes with cheers and applause)
> In terms of the MOQ, what then is 'ordinary' experience - I assume
> this makes sense as the
> mystic experience always seems to be contrasted with the non-mystic.
> As someone who
> lives in what appears to be a quite complex universe in which I am
> unable to discriminate the
> mystic realm, at least in experiences such as are described by many
> published mystics,
> I am loath to take my experience, which is both dynamic and static, as
> illusion, yet
> seemingly this is implied in much discussion of mysticism.
>
[David Buchanan] I've been trying to get at exactly this issue
for a long time. As I see it, ordinary consciousness is "dictated" by
the static patterns. Our normal mode of thinking is sort of "trapped" in
static reality. The intellectual level is a level of static patterns
after all. I couldn't begin to explain how it works, but the mystical
experience is temporary freedom from the trap. This is a little weird,
but maybe its like a shift from STATIC PATTERNS of quality to static
patterns of QUAILTY. Everything is the same as before, but the emphasis
has shifted dramatically. The static patterns, the traps, become
transparent and the Quality that underlys it all shines through as the
most important thing. Afterwords you'll often hear the neophytes say
something like, "This dumb ordinary thing? Why did I think it was so
amazing and beautiful last night? The return to ordinary consciousness
will be disappointing or even drab and depressing. But I tend to blame
that on a lack of social support, the lack of appropriate customs and
rituals in our culture.
> I have a rather strong aversion to chemically induced mystic
> experiences (perhaps an overly
> strong desire to remain in control).
>
[David Buchanan] Yes, it is the job of the intellect to predict
and control. Its part of what gives the trap its' strength and teeth. We
all can relate to the terror that comes with loss of control. And with
all the crack-heads and dead junkies in the world, you are wise to be
afraid of chemicals. I suppose there is something to be said for the
purity of synthetics, but it usually just results in an amplification of
the drug's power. Cocoa leaves and poppies don't destroy lives until the
active agents are concentrated. But in the case of mind altering
substances, they are generally unaltered plants.
> However I am also mindful of U G Krishnamurti's warning that the
> pursuit of the (fantasized?)
> goal of mystic experience may itself be the barrier to experience. It
> seems in these matters
> every suggestion has its refutation, ad nauseum.
>
>
> The really interesting aspect of the neurofeedback paradigm is the
> assumption that intellect
> itself is the villain, impeding the natural processes which occur in
> hypnogogic states just
> before or after sleep, which would ordinarily resolve trauma and
> generate insight.
>
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